I think the moment writers dream of being published, they have the same wish. They want to write the books of their heart. They want those books to reach a vast audience, and they want someone else to worry about doing all the things that turn a book from a rectangular object on a shelf into a vast global empire a la Harry Potter. Most […]

The title of this blog is things I learned from my readers. The pieces below link to comments or websites.

The main thing I learned from you folks over the course of writing the contract series is this: Not only do you pay attention, but you use this information. Almost daily now, I get letters from a writer who used some piece of the contracts blog to negotiate a better deal or to get their rights reverted or to handle a foreign rights contract.

Grand Central’s parent company Hachette is suing Grahame-Smith for $500,000, the advance on that second book of this contract.

Figure this: The publisher believes it’s better to sue the author than it is to leave that $500,000 outstanding. There are several reasons that Hachette could have made the decision to file suit.

Expect more of these kinds of suits in the future. If the writers who got huge advances do not meet their obligations with the publishers, the publishers will cut their losses and run as fast as they possibly can.

But what does this suit have to do with the contracts/dealbreakers series?

This:

For the first time, I can share with you a complete publishing contract.

I want to say nothing, but that’s not true. Traditional publishers learned a lot these past few years, and in 2014, started putting their knowledge into action. Over the next few weeks, I’ll do the traditional media thing, and provide you with my own sort of year in review. All of it will focus on publishing and writing, both indie and traditional, and all of […]

Today I had hoped to write a blog about something other than traditional publishing contracts, but events have conspired against me. Cory Doctorow published a column on Publishers Weekly’s website about a new contract demand that might be coming from Hachette. Apparently, Hachette has decided to ensure that all of its e-books have some sort of DRM. That’s an acronym for Digital Rights Management which is just […]

The Business Rusch: How Traditional Publishers Are Making Money Kristine Kathryn Rusch Of course, this past week has been just as busy in publishing as the last several weeks. The changes are amazing, especially considering how stable the industry used to be. Third quarter earnings have come in, and the publicly traded publishing companies must report them. (Or, at least, their parent companies must.) For […]

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